Instead of watching tape on their next opponent, Jon Adams and Todd Smith have kept busy watching weather reports the past four days.

As they prepare to coach in the 17th annual Sunshine Classic tonight at The College of New Jersey’s Lions Stadium, West coach Smith and East coach Adams are hoping the annual all-star classic lives up to its name and provides plenty of sunshine for their players and the crowd of fans that could be around 4,000 to see recently-graduated seniors from 25 schools in the six-county Delaware Valley area close out their high school football careers.

“The rain has made it so hard to get a good practice in,” said Adams, the Nottingham High head coach who guided his Northstars to the Central Jersey Group III state championship in December, winning 11 of 12 games overall including three straight against Shore Conference opponents.

Tonight ‘Big Dawg’ would love to finish the best season in his 23-year head coaching career with a win in the Sunshine Classic over a West team loaded with multi-skilled players.

The Delaware Valley has been deluged with rain the past week, probably more than has fallen in one area since a guy named Noah was building an ark a few thousand years ago.

Tonight’s game will be broadcast by the WBCB Sports Network on WRRC (107.7 FM) with Hall of Fame broadcaster Vince Reed on the mike. The Trentonian Pregame Show at 6:45 p.m. kicks off the broadcast.

Adams, who relinquished his coaching duties for last year’s game while recovering from an operation to wipe out cancer in his kidney, had put together an all-star squad featuring key players from his Nottingham team as well as Allentown and Northern Burlington, which also went to the C.J. III playoffs. Steinert, the 2011 C.J. III runner-up, also has a strong representation on the East team.

With record-setting 1,800-yard quarterback Nick Palladino of Allentown and Nottingham’s Luke Westerberg to throw the ball to a contingent of wide receivers including Allentown’s Jake Lewis, Hightstown’s Kevin Lenart and Max Cutler and tight ends Mark Duffy of Allentown and Ben Pagan of Peddie.

“Luke and Nick have looked good in practice,” said Adams, even though his two QBs could not put in a solid week of all-star training since Palladino played in the North/South Game and Westerberg at the baseball Carpenter Cup.

Smith, who coached eight seasons at West Windsor South and has already started preparing for his new role as offensive coordinator at Hopewell Valley, has two good passing QBs on his roster in Zach DiGregorio of Princeton and Mark Acquaviva of Hamilton.

They have quality receivers to throw to in Ewing’s Sha’vorn Cooper, Notre Dame’s Devin Griffiths and North Hunterdon’s Ed Delia and Drew Dickison.

But it’s obvious the key to success for a good East defense anchored by New Egypt’s 150-tackle linebacker Kevin Mason and Hightstown’s Joe Decristofaro, led up front by Jake Andrecik of Notitngham, Frank Juba and Chi Oriji of Allentown and Eddie Ashley of Steinert, Joe Kparaway of Nottingham and Andrew Cargil of Northern Burlington in the secondary is to stop the running back no one in the Colonial Valley Conference shutdown for three years.

WW-P South’s 5,000-yard, 65-touchdown back Brian Schoenauer, who will be complimented by Hamilton’s Ruben Desane and WW-P North’s Tyrone Parker, makes the West a big favorite to win for the second year in a row.

Last summer, the West ended four years of East wins with a 16-6 victory, missing out by a minute of the first Sunshine shutout in eight years.